Like this:

Below you can read a synopsis of a holiday story I’m working on. I’d like to publish in time for the 2015 holidays. This is a 2nd-draft synopsis. I’ve already begun writing the book, so I’d like to share the synopsis with you. Of course, I’m not much of a synopsis writer – I’m terrible at it, and usually deviate from the plan when I do get into a story anyway.

This is a quick synopsis, more like the long version of a back cover, so the end is not revealed. Only more questions. 😉

Your comments are always welcome.

Here goes nothing. Enjoy!

BACK TO DECEMBER
Synopsis:
After graduating college with a bachelor’s degree in creative writing, Joy can’t see herself going back to the one-horse town she grew up in. She sees no future in playwriting there, or anywhere else in Texas, whatsoever. She knows she has to go somewhere else to make her dreams a reality. With ideas of grandeur, places like Los Angeles and New York City etch all sorts of pretty lies on her brain.

During her last months at college, Joy meets and becomes enamored with her ticket out. One of her plays peaks the interest of handsome Blake Grant, a PhD student and son of a popular playwright. The beautiful, romantic former Homecoming Queen leaves her old high school flame, Sam, behind to run off with her new man; an exciting man who convinces her she is everything to him.

Her heart wanders back to Sam sometimes and the awful way she ended their six-year romance during a cold December rain. The guilt haunts her so she cuts most ties with her roots; not just with Sam, but with her lifelong best friend, Cammy , her former teachers, and even her own father. She cannot let those memories interfere with the present.

Joy’s play becomes a Broadway hit, as her husband, a talent agent, lights up the grandest stages with his clients. Life is striking and busy until a house fire destroys her life. Blake takes what’s left of her dignity as he dumps her for someone else. To top it all off, the woman who is supposed to be her best friend betrays her in an unforgivable way, breaking Joy’s trust in her forever.

Joy is emotionally and physically scarred for eternity. She knows nothing but regret, grief, and betrayal, and after realizing the last few years of her life were a lie, she wonders if she would be better off dead.

Broken, frightened, exhausted and alone, Joy is unable to stand life in New York with nothing but ghosts to keep her company. She comes to realize that the last few years of her life had been an illusion and she longs for those old creature comforts and real friends of home.

Embarrassed and ashamed – not just of how her life turned out, or of the scars the fire left on her, but of her actions before she left for New York, she returns to her hometown of Greenland. With the exception of a few vacations to the Texas Gulf Coast, and a weekend or two in Austin, the tiny Central Texas town, population 1000, surrounded by family-owned farms and cattle and horse ranches had been all she had known until her move to New York City.

As she approaches the old homestead on a rainy Christmas Eve, she is unsure of her future. What she left behind in New York was hell. It was thwarting, heart wrenching and sickening. A thousand questions run through her mind. Can her family overlook her former transgressions? Will she and her father be able to mend their broken fences? And, how much do the good folks of Greenland really know about her time away? Can the people she grew up with forgive a small-town girl’s ideas of greatness and welcome her back into the fold?

Even more worrisome, what humiliation will she face after leaving her old flame standing in the rain one night to run off with a big-city guy? Can he forgive? Will he be able to look past her scars as if they’re not there?

She wants no one’s pity. She just wants to go home. If only she could go back to that December and make it right.

I’m happy (and proud) to announce that my new novel is hitting the shelves on February 5th.

Published by 5 Prince Books, Permanent Spring Showers is a work of literary fiction, filled with scandals, surprises, art, humor, romance (i.e., sex), and manipulation. Here is the back cover description of the work:

Professor Rebecca Stanley-Wilson is having a very bad season. Her husband has just admitted to having an affair. And it was with one of her students.

Blame it on a desire for revenge (or way too much alcohol), she then has had one of her own. Unfortunately for her, her affair was with one of the great upcoming painters of his generation. The ramifications of that one torrid evening will not only be felt across her life but over the entire art world.

Sexy, funny, and very surprising, Permanent Spring Showers is the tale of…

Today I want to talk about an interesting facet of being human, one that can very much influence character development in our fiction and help make our characters–whether protagonists, antagonists, or supporting cast–feel more “real.”

The idea for this post came to me reflecting on one of my favorite prayers. I try to say it every morning (or at least most mornings.) It rings very true to me. I like this prayer because I know myself well enough to know that my greatest weakness are probably not what I think they are, nor do I really understand my strengths.

(That’s going to be the main point of this post, by the way: how well do we really know ourselves? How well do our characters? So bear with me.)

Like this:

Bryan and Julie Dylan are a married couple who are not speaking to each other. Julie gave birth to a stillborn child and Bryan is convinced the baby wasn’t his. Julie knows it wasn’t. Bryan gets even by cheating on her. They can’t seem to get past what Julie thinks of as The Incident. They only things they have in common anymore are the bills and the apartment.

When their realtor calls with an amazing house at an amazing price that they can actually afford, they decide that this could be the restart of their marriage.

Instead of the realtor, a neighbor meets them to give them the house key. He seems inordinately happy that they intend to move in. The house is perfectly maintained, inside, as well as out. They explore and everything they see convinces them that this is the house for them.